17 Aug 2016

‘Pleading The Hillary’: Assange Demands Same Treatment From DOJ

Julian Assange says the Department of Justice (DoJ) investigation of Hillary Clinton “set a new standard” and the WikiLeaks founder is now demanding the precedents set by the DoJ should be applied to their never ending case against him.

Assange appeared on CNN’s The Lead on Monday via video link from the Ecuadorian embassy in London where he has been exiled since 2012.

“Our D.C. lawyers are delivering a letter tomorrow to Attorney General Loretta Lynch asking her to explain why it is that the now six-year-long national security and criminal investigation being run against WikiLeaks, the reason I have political asylum, has not been closed,” he said.

“Because the DOJ, whose actions seem to be setting a new standard by closing the Hillary Clinton case,” Assange added. “The Hillary Clinton case has only gone for one year.

“Hillary Clinton’s case has been dropped, the case against WikiLeaks continues. So why is it that the, quote, ‘pending law enforcement proceedings’ against WikiLeaks continue? There’s a problem here.”

Assange isn’t the first to “plead the Hillary.” Last week a US Navy sailor asked for leniency after pleading guilty to “unlawful retention of national defense information,” pointing to similarities between Clinton’s case and his own.

Assange compared the DOJ’s six-year investigation of his organization WikiLeaks with the department’s quickfire probe of Clinton, the Democratic presidential nominee. FBI Director James Comey criticized Clinton for being “extremely careless” before recommending against charges.

“It was closed under the basis that James Comey said that they couldn’t establish that there was an intent to damage national security,” he said of the DOJ’s probe of Clinton. “In our case, there’s no allegation that we have done anything except publish information for the public.

“The U.S. government had to say under oath in 2013 not a single person has been physically harmed by our publication. You don’t have intent. You don’t have serious harm.”

Assange said Clinton’s campaign is trying to discredit WikiLeaks by focusing on his status as a non-American. There has long been a belief he could be declared an “enemy combatant” conducting “political warfare against the United States.“

“Of course they’re desperate for anything,” he said. “We operate and report on all different countries. We have staff in the United States. That’s what we do for every country.

“Once again, they’re trying to distract from the revelations that caused four, the top four officials, including [former Democratic National Committee Chairwoman] Debbie Wasserman Schultz, to resign.”

WikiLeaks published a trove of 20,000 DNC emails in late July covering the period from last January to late May. In ominous news for the DNC, Assange has promised there aremore to come.

Some of the emails proved what many observers suspected all along – that the DNC was colluding with Clinton to undermine the insurgent Bernie Sanders campaign in the battle for the Democratic presidential nomination.

Assange has repeatedly insisted that his organization’s publishing of the emails was not intended to undermine Clinton’s campaign, but is rather part of a wider campaign to “publish the truth about power.“

“We are very interested in power and publishing the truth about power so people can work out however they choose so they can reform power.”